


And it's not tonight where I'm set alight and I blink in sight of your blinding light

by gipsiusy



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Drunken Shenanigans, Fluff, M/M, Missing Scenes, after the nearly apocalypse, aziraphale choose weird moments to say things, crowley doesn't know how to handle things, declaration, did I wrote it? yes, even if i mean, i just needed some softness, look im tagging but do I really know what I am doing? no, night fair, not love declaration, plotbunny because why not, slice of live, this is romantic not platonic r o m a n t i c, tipsy more than drunk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-26
Updated: 2019-06-26
Packaged: 2020-05-20 03:56:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19369327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gipsiusy/pseuds/gipsiusy
Summary: Great victories come from great grieves. Anyway, this is just supposition. I like to suppose things and see if I'm right." He smirked at the poor demon while sitting next to him on the couch. "And I suppose that Michael and Gabriel still are needed in their position. And I suppose you and I survived for a reason. You, not being a total prick, even if you fell, is for a reason. And this reason is ineffable, but I don’t need to know it to understand that your role as humanity saviour will not be forgotten.Or, the one time Aziraphale decide to give Crowley a piece of his mind and nearly broke him.





	And it's not tonight where I'm set alight and I blink in sight of your blinding light

**Author's Note:**

> English is not my first language so please forgive me for any mistake.  
> Special thank you to Rita, who is always there listening to my ramblings at one am <3

Crowley sometimes envied humanity. Not that he would ever admit it to any breathing, living soul. Or a dead one. Actually, even the teller of this tale should be fast in their packing and flew the Country before the fallen angel realizes they revealed this very important and absolutely untrue piece of information.

But the truth is, he really did. This time is because they can refuse to accept the existence of God. Human beings can ignore and spend their entire life not believing there’s some All-powerful, all-knowing entity who is responsible for their existence.

Anthony J. Crowley, being a fallen angel, having met Them in the first place, cannot. Sure, is not a fan or anything - not after the last 6000 years. But still, it would be like ignore the air you get through your lungs or something. You can forget, in a way, about it, but not unknown that there is.

Humans. So damn lucky. Able to ask questions without being cast out of their home. Able to hurt each other without knowing how bad they will actually provoke. It’s like a chain reaction or that absurd story of the butterfly and the hurricane. Something in the middle.

What was absolutely the worst was, though, when the evil they were doing had consequences right in front of their eyes and they insisted to deny it.

In those cases, Crowley would have loved to ignore the existence of God. He would have a blast if he convinced himself no one was in charge, there, and everything happened because of a cruel mix of chance and human idiocy.

He was  sitting in his Bentley, waiting for Aziraphale to show up.

Another thing Crowley did, but maybe this one would have caused less trouble to share, was spending nearly every evening with Aziraphale. Anyone a little bit knowing of human mind and how it reacts when something scary happens in our life would have said that after Aziraphale discorporation ( Death , Crowly thought.  Death  was the closest thing to what he felt happening at that moment), the demon felt the need to be very often in the same room where Aziraphale was, being him, in fact, not dead.

But then again, Crowley wasn’t human.

And he did not need to explain why he found himself every other night, without bothering to have an actual reason half of them, sharing it with the angel. It was something that happened and for once it wasn’t something bad so why bother asking questions? Last time only got him trouble.

His trail of thoughts got interrupted by the angel himself lightly knocking on the Bentley to catch his attention. Crowley did a vague gesture of acknowledging and waited for him to be inside the car.

“Good evening, dear,” Aziraphale said, “ready for our little adventure?”, chuckling a little.

Crowley automatically smiled, even if from outside it looked like a smirk.

“it’s a night fair, not an adventure. Mid-day during King Arthur times were more dangerous than this”

“Oh now, now, don’t be such a hum-drummy” he laughed at his own wordplay, making Crowley nearly slammed on the breaks for it. How a person so acculturate, who read so much and knew so much would come up with such weird phrases was way beyond him.

“At least tell me where I’m driving to, would you?” he asked instead, getting a good look at him. Aziraphale explained the road, using a lot of gesture and even more inappropriate terminology and Crowley decided he would have gifted him with a GPS or something like that. Still, it was enchanting to observe. Until he screamed because he was going to cause an incident, and at that moment none of them could afford to lose a body.

The evening went and passed rather adventure-less. Of course, after the Apocalyisn’t [1]  everything seemed dull and normal. Even more, if you have six thousand years worth of things happening. Aziraphale found some books he was interested in, Crowley made a little miracle of his own to see a girl fight for the prices of some baked product that a customer wanted to buy at a less price for his own amusement - bad for him, because that brought attention to the little cart and the girl walked out of the fair after finishing everything, making her fight a good thing, after all.

One of the things both Aziraphale and Crowley appreciated of those fairs was that there would at least a place - in that case, four - selling alcohol in many shapes. They had Italian liquors, French wine, one who sells Scotch from all over the world and a modest beer seller with home made beer. The two of them, being around from the dawn of times, loved being still able to taste new things with whatever human thought to do with alcohol. Hence, they tasted something in every place and still got back from time to time. Crowley walked out with twelve bottles of scotch and ten of liquors - all different-, while Aziraphale with ten white wine he loved so much to finish at least one bottle on his own. Which meant that from their standards they were sober enough to do anything but so happy and relaxed that nothing seemed worthy of it.

So around three am they got back in the car, where all their purchasing were correctly and conveniently already settled and were still laughing while getting into it.

“I can’t believe Jean really did that” Aziraphale was saying, waving a hand like to wave himself. “He really hated you”

“Listen” Crowley tried to explain, but the angel’s laugh was contagious “Lis-Listen. I.. it wasn’t my fault, okay? He was try-trying to sell a normal grass snake like a terrible poisonous snake from Australia. I didn’t mean to interfere. I was just trying to correct some things he said.. and it slipped. Literally slipped from his hands and bit him. He was lucky it wasn’t th--- now you’re just laughing at me, aren’t you?”

Aziraphale moved the head from one side to another, without making an actual sound.

“Is just. Snakes. You are a snake. They’ve must recogn-- recogn-- seen you like his master or something. Hiss master, to be clear”

Crowley hated how hard he laughed at that bad joke, he really hated himself.

They spent the rest of the ride to Soho in companionable silence except for the music - all Queen, of course - or sometimes getting a little chuckle by the angel on his left side.

They got to the library and Aziraphale asked some help carrying his stuff inside.

“You’ve been an angel, thank you”

“AH bloody ah” replied Crowley with a huff.

“Are you in for a nightcap?” the angel offered while examining one of the bottles he just bought.

“More like a dawncap” murmured the devil, already collecting the glasses

Needless to say, in half an hour, they were already tipsy. Not properly drunk, but standing was a way harder job than Crowley remembered.

“Aziraphale” he called, getting the attention of his friend, “do you ever think about when they’ll be back?”

"They?" he sounded honestly confused.

"You know... Heaven. Hell. When they get their stuff together they're gonna come. And Earth can't do so well with us two and an antichrist. Barely did it the first time"

Aziraphale lowered his gaze, considering what he said.

"I believe we're gonna be alright. Or not. But sure enough, we're not abandoned to ourselves. The Almighty gave humans all the protection they needed the first time, Didn't They?"

He smiled and Crowley was lost for a moment.

Now, Crowley was an optimistic demon. You need to when you dedicated half of your existence to defy the basic rules of hell and somehow you're still alive to tell. But he was also very pragmatic and even the booze inside him wasn't enough to make him forget any of the ridiculous circumstances in which they lives were just, figuratively, yesterday.

"If a baby antichrist and the hope he would renounce the Devil can't be called good protection. It's barely the idea or protection, it's the abstract idea or the thought of--", Crowley went on, but Aziraphale cut him short.

"I was talking about you. And me, of course, but mostly you".

Crowley stared at him for a long moment. Maybe they were drunker than he thought. He tried to sit more properly, hoping that getting his head right would clear the meaning of whatever Aziraphale was trying to say.

"What in the heaven are you blabbering about, angel?"

Aziraphale looked at him like when he's going to explain some of his magic tricks. Like he knew a truth so obvious that made the fact that some couldn't see it even funnier.

"You were one of Their greatest protection to the Earth. I believe they have faith in you. No, really, I know it sounds weird and you're going to scoff at me but I have my reasons".

Crowley rolled his yellow eyes, in fact scoffing.

"I'm a fallen angel. A Rebel. It's nonsensical what you are saying".

Aziraphale put down his glass, half full, to look at him directly.

"You fell, and yet you decided to save them. Not only now. You could be the worst of them. The Greatest Enemy the Heaven need to battle before Satan and yet, you choose to not to. Some causal evil, yes, but I know your mind.” He smiled a little, at that, like he was remembering something specific, but then he got serious again.

“They created you, They know what you're capable of, the way you're restraining yourself. No, not restraining. Just choosing to moderate. I do know it, and I've met you later than Her"

The worst thing about all those words was that Aziraphale sounded so sure. Like he actually put some thought in it.

Crowley was speechless, which was always an event. His mouth opened a little, trying to form some retort. Aziraphale waited, sipping calmly his wine. To be fair to Crowley, he didn't expect anything like that from that night.

"Why let me fall, then. Even if all this was true, why send me down." He asked, in the end. "If I didn't deserve this if I..if I was so needed why... why? This makes no sense". He raised his voice but he didn’t care. He sounded a bit hysterical, which he decided was totally understandable being what his frie-ange-Aziraphale talking about was totally maniac.

"They believe in you. They trust you. They knew that even if fallen, you wouldn't become part of Satan’s army. And They were right"

"I did evil things, Aziraphale, what God would accept it"

"Humans do evil things all the time. Me too... I did some unethical work, sometimes. That doesn't make you unworthy of Their trust. You are what saved this world, after all."

“It’s not the same! I.. We... Angels are not supposed to do bad things.”

“Michael and Gabriel are Archangel and yet they did nothing to prevent the death of all humanity, which is by default a bad thing, don’t you think? It's the Judas paradox: for Jesus to die, Judas needed to betray him, so Judas sacrifice was as important as Jesus one, in order to save humanity. At least, if catholic church made any sense at all. There is still a Great Plan, you know?"

“ah, yes. The same one who saw all humanity extinguished, right? A bit cruel, if you ask me.”

"Great victories come from great grieves. Anyway, this is just supposition. I like to suppose things and see if I'm right." He smirked at the poor demon while sitting next to him on the couch. "And I suppose that Michael and Gabriel still are needed in their position. And I suppose you and I survived for a reason. You, not being a total prick, even if you fell, is for a reason. And this reason is ineffable, but I don’t need to know it to understand that your role as humanity saviour will not be forgotten. You, my dear Anthony J Crowley," he waited until Crowley yellow eyes were on him again, "are more a hero than you feel comfortable to accept, and sometimes I  feel the need to tell you, because I'm afraid no one else ever will.”

His hand was on Crowley one - a casual touch, something that the cool skin of the demon was craving without knowing. He controlled himself enough to not withdraw it, though, because out of sudden everything was too much.

He sat in silence during all Aziraphale speech, and a few moments more when he finished, but in the end, he got up and didn’t even bother to say goodbye or stop the bell from ringing [2] , busy as he was to run towards his car and possibly discorporation.

Aziraphale didn’t look so worried, just a little sad - he didn’t meant to upset him. 

Crowley left, yes, but he knew he would come back. He always did. 

A week later, the familiar black shape returned to the shop. The bell didn't ring, but a white box smelling delicious was set in front of Aziraphale. The angel smiled, radiant, both at the baked good and at the one who delivered it.

"I talked to Anathema, since your idea of protection is worse than the invention of the coitus interruptus. She says she'll help us shield my apartment and the bookshop from external forces" he mimicked the air quotes, casually leaning against one of the shelves.

Aziraphale looked at him, without talking. Then he got up and placed himself in front of him. Always the best to understand what Crowley was really saying. See, he didn't have his way with words, but that didn't mean he couldn't make his point come across clear as light.

They looked at each other for a moment. The angel could clearly see Crowley eyes through the glasses, doesn't matter how concealing they were.

"Next time you pull something like that without a warning, I'll dump you and make a new life on Alpha Centaury, but for real."

Aziraphale caressed his face, lightly.

"Whatever you say, my dear."

He always comes back.

* * *

[1]  Another of Aziraphale’s wordplay. They kinda of stuck with him. Sometimes.

[2]  Ever since the bookshop opening, that bell never ringed once when Crowley got in or out of the place. He really hated that sound.

**Author's Note:**

> this was supposed to be a little scene of a greater story  
> instead, turned out to be a great scene of a no-existential story. What can I say? I hope you enjoyed it, tho  
> see you around! bye :*


End file.
